J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ise

friendlyface wrote:Hi Ross ...the Mission an intermediate ski? ... I dont think so, its basically a twin trip for all the mountain, the cost reflects this to (£500 + ).
Im not a bad skier, ski reds well but lose a little of my style on blacks!
The Mission ski is for advance/expert skier, I hardly end up on my arse during my week trips ...half a dozen times on the Missions.
A ski instructor told me that you have to "roll" the skis to keep the edges alive when ski-ing straight at speed, the edges are so unforgiving if you are not on top of them!

They really are an intermediate ski, some of it's just a question of language and terms but an intermediate ski would be one that requires the skills an intermediate skier has in the terrain they're skiing. That means red runs, the odd black, some off piste near the piste etc.

An expert ski would be something that requires some real skills to ski, like a race tuned slalom ski, some superfat powder ski, a featherlight tour ski etc, maybe you say it's something that's hopeless outside its home environment.

The mission's quite a good ski, it is a successor to the PR in that it appeals to same people but it's a way better ski than that ever was.

You probably want to roll a ski onto the edge most of the time, if you run it flat you'll catch something and end up on the floor sooner or later )

bandit wrote:
I thought that the Mission was the New B2 :?:

The Pocket Rocket is the all time Supernoodle )

that comes to about the same thing doesn't it? ) I'll bet you there's more former pocket rocket owners on Missions :-)

anyway, is that the new new B2 or the new old B2 ? it's so hard to keep up with fashion.

Rossfra8 wrote:I was under the impression the Mission was more for the intermediate skier?!

me too, the spiritual successor to the Pocket Rocket in fact )

skidaddle wrote:I have no experience of Swiss rail travel, but I can say that OBB (Austrian) is a joy to use. It puts all the British services to shame, with punctuality, cleanliness and evrything else you care to mention.

actually I'll stick up for British trains surprisingly maybe ) I took a trip a few weeks back from Derby to Llandudno Junction and back and it was excellent. £34.50 each way and £6 to upgrade to first class for the outbound journey, the trains were punctual, clean and comfortable and the 1st class was worth every penny, free drinks and newspapers all the way.

What was poor was the booking process and the stations and the utter stupidity of their information, for example, stood on a platform you hear "the 1st class accommodation is at the rear of the train" which is useless unless you know what direction the train will arrive from and ironically turned out to be wrong anyway. Here, the platform is labelled A/B/C etc which is a small but useful thing.

I'll be doing the same journey again without hesitation.

bandit wrote:

ise wrote:

bandit wrote:
I agree, the costs do not stack up against air travel at the moment.

It's a shame, probably if oil carries on being expensive the comparative cost will drop though. It's certainly basically pretty quick, from Lausanne to Paris takes no time at all and it's not so bad on London.

London to Lausanne is not so hot on timings though. AFAICS with an early start in the UK, there is only 1 train to be caught in Paris, and that gets into Lausanne before 5pm. For me, 1 more train, and then the last bus up the valley (or spend the night in Sierre if any connections fail).

Lausanne to London seems to have better service times :?:

You can also go via Neuchâtel which is a quick and regular service, from there it's easy to get to Lausanne or Bern if you were going to the Jungfrau etc.

It's sad but if Eurostar were a full part of the SNCF network you can bet it would be a better and cheaper service, the partial opt-out the UK has from the Schengen accords makes it harder than it should be as well. Moving from Switzerland into Austria on the train is a breeze, despite not being in the EU Switzerland is party to the useful bits of Schengen. It's unfortunate for me that SNCF don't give me a discount with my rail pass like Austria and Germany do as well :(

bandit wrote:
I agree, the costs do not stack up against air travel at the moment.

It's a shame, probably if oil carries on being expensive the comparative cost will drop though. It's certainly basically pretty quick, from Lausanne to Paris takes no time at all and it's not so bad on London.

bandit wrote:Yes, I know it's direct on the RER, however if you have bulky luggage the Metro access is reported to be awkward. It can be more civilised to pop across the road from the station, order a coffee and ask the bartender to call you a taxi, neatly bypassing the taxi rank queue....allegedly. Anyway, Seat 61 website is quite useful with timings.
http://www.seat61.com/Paris-metro.htm

I worked in Paris for a while, I don't recall it being a problem, I'd read the Seat 61 stuff as well, it's about the best source of info around but they do have RER times wrong, it's only a few minutes from GdL to GdN and they reckon something like 30 minutes.

It's the cost though, it's not cheap compared to flying each time I look. I looked this morning and it's 100 chf more on the train than flying and the full cost end to end for the journey I wanted to make is a few hundred chf different. It's just not as cost effective as continental rail travel is for me normally and the Eurostar ticket conditions are inflexible.

bandit wrote:

ise wrote:

bandit wrote:

I just knew you should have gone by train )

yes, you can take as much as you can carry for no extra cost. It's that connection in Paris that's a problem though, it's not too bad in London now the Eurostar terminal's moved although that depends where you're going of course.

I know you have to change stations, and I hear that the easiest way with a large bag is to get a taxi, and not to use the Metro.

So everyone says, I suspect that's untrue though, it's a direct connection on the RER so I can't see why it's harder than using the underground in London other than people struggling with the language which is fair enough. You need some time though, it's a 30 min checkin for the Eurostar. And it's weird there's apparently no overnight service.

I really must try it sometime.